All American Boy

by William J. Mann

  If Ned had been there, he would’ve stopped it. He would have saved David from the beating he got. But Ned wasn’t a classmate of theirs at St. John the Baptist school. Ned was far, far away, in a place Wally had yet to even hear of. In eighth grade, Wally had no idea that Ned even existed—so there was no one he could have imagined, no one to conjure up in his thoughts, to rush in and rescue poor David Schnur.

  Least of all himself.

  They ganged up on him. All the boys from the eighth grade class of St. John the Baptist surrounded the new boy, the Jewboy, David Schnur, and they attacked. Freddie led the way, but they all got in their licks. Even Wally.

  Dear God, even me.

  Had he punched him? Maybe kicked him in the ribs when he was down? Wally can’t remember what he did, and doesn’t want to, but he knows he did something. In high school—a year and a whole world away from that incident outside the grammar school—David would become Wally’s friend. His only friend really. Never did they mention the incident to each other. Maybe David didn’t know Wally had been a part of it. So many boys had participated that maybe David hadn’t realized Wally was there.

  He knew. Of course he knew.

  “Take that, you Jew faggot!” Freddie shrilled, kneeing David right in the balls. The boy crumpled and fell to the ground screaming. The boys moved in, kicking David between them like a soccer ball. David let out a hideous scream, a sound like a train whistle, or the screeching brakes of a bus. That’s when Father Carson bolted out of the rectory and the boys ran like hell in a dozen different directions.

  Wally ran, too, taking refuge on the side of the school building. From there he could watch as the priest knelt beside David. Father Carson, so young, so handsome. He was so kind to David, so gentle. He helped the boy to his feet, his arm around his back, leading him into the rectory. Wally’s heart was racing in his chest. He would remember looking up at the sky and being surprised by how bright and blue it was, how beautiful was the day, indifferent to the horror that had just taken place. Pigeons were cooing on the window sills. A bluejay squawked from a telephone wire. Wally stood there, panting. He wondered if David would die, if they’d kicked a hole in his head, or ruptured a lung, or tore open his stomach.

  Jew faggot.

  Wally began to cry. He was a smart boy. He knew what was coming.

  From his pocket he produced a coin. A quarter probably, or maybe a dime, one with a rough edge. He began to scratch at the mortar between the brownstones of the school building. He scratched carefully and diligently, intent at his task, forming each letter with deliberate strokes.

  “Here,” he says finally, turning to Dee. “Here it is.”

  The boy leans in.

  Etched into the stone, faded by time but still plain to see, are two simple words:

  HELP ME.

  “So,” Dee asks him, “did you ever get beaten up like that yourself?”

  “Not like that. And not at school. Just by my father.”

  They’re sitting out on Missy’s back steps, smoking a joint, a tiny hangnail of a moon riding high in the sky. Wally feels a hand slide into the pocket of his coat. It’s chilly out here. They can actually see their breath in front of their faces. Dee pushes his shoulder into Wally’s, nestling in close to him for warmth. He shoves his hand down deep into Wally’s pocket and looks up into his eyes.

  “I got beaten up even worse that that,” the boy tells him. “One time a bunch of kids in sixth grade threw me out the second-floor window of my school. And then down on the ground there was another group of assholes waiting to wipe the playground with my sorry faggot ass.”

  Wally looks over at him. The moonlight plays with his face, making him seem at turns both younger and older than he is.

  “How did they know you were gay in sixth grade?”

  “I was always playing Mariah Carey on my Walkman. I had photos from Saved by the Bell all over my locker. On my math book cover I drew a big red heart and wrote I LOVE JOEY LAWRENCE.”

  Wally smiles. “Okay, so maybe there were a few clues.”

  “It was all so mid-nineties.” Dee shudders, snuggling in closer against Wally. “Of course, that was before my mother went crazy and married Leo.”

  Wally can smell the boy’s hair. It’s freshly washed and all of the usual spiking gel is gone. Still orange, but it’s soft. And sweet.

  “Has your mother tried to contact you at all?”

  “Nope. In court she said she was praying for me.”

  “And she’s still with the bastard?”

  Dee nods. “Of course she is. She doesn’t believe in divorce.”

  “But kicking her kid out of the house is okay.”

  “Hey, I was the one to leave. The day they took me to see that faith healer freak—man, I knew it was time to go. And my caseworker knew just the place for me.” He grins, rubbing his head against Wally’s arm like a cat.

  Wally thinks about standing up. It would break the contact between them. It would get Dee’s hand out of his pocket. It would end the buzz he’s feeling, the stirring in his crotch. But he doesn’t. He just takes in a long breath and lets it out slowly.

  He looks across the yard and sees himself, fifteen years ago, sneaking over Miss Aletha’s back fence. Across town, Dee would have been in his crib, teething. Wally’s mouth was sore then, too. Bleeding even. His father had punched out a tooth.

  “There was nothing official about it when I came here,” Wally says. “Missy just took me in. There had been so much scandal that my father didn’t want anymore, so when I refused to come home, he just said, ‘Fine, let him stay there.’ He disowned me as his son, said a faggot belongs with a freak anyway.”

  They’re quiet. Wally feels whatever’s buzzing between them ratchet up another level. He can’t let it go on any longer. So he stands. Dee’s hand falls out of his pocket.

  “I’m going to bed, buddy,” Wally says thickly. “It’s getting too cold out here.”

  The boy looks up at him. “Even with all that shit, look how good you still turned out. Famous actor and everything.”

  “Sarcastic brat,” Wally says, grinning down at him.

  “Maybe a little.” Dee stands. “But actually you did end up okay. You didn’t kill yourself or become a drug addict or a hustler.”

  Wally smirks. “Some would say unemployed actor is only a step away from drug addict or hustler.”

  “Oh come on. You did that movie with Susan Lucci.”

  “My big claim to fame.”

  “And that other one, with Judith Light.”

  Wally laughs in disbelief. “I played a taxicab driver in that one. I had one line. How’d you know about it?”

  “You’re on the Internet Movie Database. I checked you out when Missy said you were coming. I rented whatever I could find.”

  Wally looks into the boy’s eyes. He’s adorable. He’s goddamn fucking adorable. “I’ve got to go to bed,” he says softly.

  “Tell me the truth, Wally. Do you think what Zandy did with you was wrong?”

  Wally says nothing in response. He just keeps looking into Dee’s eyes. The night is so still, seeming to have dropped over them like a heavy blanket. Wally can hear his heart beating in his ears.

  “I mean, you said he taught you stuff,” Dee says. “Told you that you’d change the world.”

  “He said we would change the world. Gays. Homos.”

  “And we have, haven’t we?”

  Wally smiles weakly. “I suppose we have.”

  Equal rights, TV shows, civil unions, even honest-to-goodness marriage in some places. Ned might be dead, and Zandy might be dying, and Wally might be here tonight alone—but still, we did it. We changed the world.

  “I wouldn’t ever be straight,” Dee’s saying, “even if it meant things would be easier for me. I know that much anyway.”

  Wally keeps looking at him. The orange hair, the piercings, the defiant little jut to his chin, the adolescent, self-defensive sarcasm. And yet, he’s already as wis
e as Wally. There’s nothing left to teach him.

  Except …

  “Guess I’ll see you in the morning then,” Dee says, turning away from Wally’s silence.

  “Donald,” Wally says, and his voice comes out like a croak.

  The boy looks back.

  Wally approaches him. He places his hands on his shoulders.

  “What is it?” Dee asks. “What’s up with you?”

  Wally leans down and kisses him, full on the lips.

  Hard candy and licorice. That’s what the boy’s skin tastes like. They’re in Wally’s bed, and Wally is running his tongue over Dee’s face, around his neck, across his smooth chest. Beneath him the boy is writhing, his cock standing up hard and straight, so incongruous to his slim body. It’s a big, proud nine-incher, blood engorged, putting Wally’s to shame.

  “Oh, man,” Dee says. “Oh, fucking man.”

  Wally’s tongue circles first one nipple, then the next. He flicks the little pink buds. Dee nearly jumps through the ceiling. “Oh, man! Oh, fucking man!”

  What did I taste like? What did my skin remind him of? Maybe milk and Sugar Pops. Orange soda. Nestlé’s Quik.

  “This feels so good,” Dee says, grabbing Wally by the shoulders.

  “Yeah,” he tells him. “Yeah, it does.”

  “You’re great, Wally, you know that? You’re great.”

  The boy’s eyes shine. Wally won’t let himself think. He just pushes down and kisses Dee hard, their tongues dueling for supremacy inside their mouths. They wrestle each other, rolling back and forth on the bed. Dee’s cock is dripping precum. Wally licks it like a melting ice cream cone, one big swipe of his tongue up the shaft. Dee moans.

  “Hey,” the boy says suddenly, grabbing Wally’s wrists.

  Wally looks up at him. Dee’s eyes bear down at him across his chest, still glistening from Wally’s saliva.

  “What did your boyfriend die of?”

  “AIDS,” Wally says, and he can taste Dee’s precum as it slides down his throat.

  The boy sits up on his elbows. “Do you have it, too?”

  Wally sits back against the wall, feeling his cock soften even as Dee’s remains stiff and hard, pointing at the ceiling.

  This is it: the source of his pain.

  This is why he wakes every morning alone.

  This is what burns at him, keeps him from living, from breathing, from looking up at the sky. This is what sent him into that depression all those months ago, sent him to those drugs, those doctors, to that place Cheri found for him. A little rest home, she called it. A retreat. Yeah, right. It was a funny farm. A nuthouse. A fucking insane asylum. And Wally had been there for almost six months, lost in his grief.

  “I don’t have it, Dee,” he tells the boy finally. “I don’t know why or how but I don’t. I should have it. I should be dead.”

  Wally closes his eyes. He feels his cock shrink, curl inward, take refuge in his pubic hair.

  Dee slides over to sit beside him. “I don’t think I have it either,” he says, “but I was only tested once, and that was last year.”

  Wally opens his eyes and studies the boy’s face. How serious he is. How sincere. How brilliant his blue eyes, only an inch now from Wally’s own.

  “Can I ask a question, Wally?” the boy asks.

  Wally nods.

  “How many times have you done this?”

  Wally blinks. “Done what?”

  “This.”

  “You mean … had sex?”

  “Yeah. With a guy.”

  “Christ, Dee, I don’t know. You mean in my whole life?”

  “Yeah,” Dee says.

  Wally laughs. “I can’t count. I mean—hundreds. Ned and I—we played around a lot. Together and separately. It was okay, we understood it. It was the way we lived.”

  “I’ve done it three times,” Dee tells him.

  “Three times,” Wally echoes.

  They look at each other, not saying anything for several seconds.

  Then Dee falls back into the pillows. “Come on, Wally, fuck me.”

  Wally lies down on top of him. They start to kiss but Wally’s dick stays soft. He licks the boy’s neck, nibbles his ears. He tries to taste again the candy of his skin, but he’s becoming self-conscious now, aware of how stubbornly soft his dick remains.

  “Here,” Dee says, pushing him up and going down on him. Wally’s not prepared. The warmth of the boy’s mouth takes him by surprise. He tries to will himself a boner but it’s just not working. Even with Dee’s lips sliding up and down, Wally can’t get hard. Meanwhile, the boy’s cock remains so effortlessly engorged.

  “I want you to fuck me,” Dee says, looking up from Wally’s crotch.

  “There’s more to sex than fucking,” Wally says, gently guiding the boy by the shoulders back up to the pillows. He pushes Dee’s legs up into the air and aims his tongue toward his anus. The boy shudders when Wally makes contact, shouting out, gripping the sheets with his hands. Dee’s insides are more tart than his skin, tangy and a little gritty. Wally inhales deeply the boy’s spunkiness, and massages his silky tissues with his tongue.

  “Oh, man, Wally, oh, fucking man,” Dee moans.

  Wally’s cock is lengthening. He reaches over the side of the bed, finding his backpack on the floor, all without breaking contact between his mouth and Dee’s anus. He unzips the backpack, fumbling inside for a condom. He finds one, tears it open without looking, and begins manipulating it over the tip of his cock.

  “Aw, yeah, Wally, fuck me.”

  But as soon as the latex begins to unroll, Wally loses his erection again, and rolls over onto his back in frustration.

  “What’s the matter?” Dee asks.

  “I … I’m too tired, I guess.”

  “It’s okay. Just do what you were doing.”

  Wally sighs, returning his tongue to the boy’s butt. Dee spits into his hand and begins masturbating his enormous cock. In moments he shoots, sending gallons of semen across the bed, several globs landing in Wally’s hair.

  “Impressive,” Wally says, smiling.

  Dee just closes his eyes.

  Wally stands, searching for something to clean up the mess. He settles on a dirty sock, wiping off the boy’s chest first, then trying without much luck to get the jizz out of his hair. Dee still lies there with his eyes closed. Wally tosses the sock into the corner of the room and settles back in beside the boy, putting his arm around him.

  “You are so adorable,” Wally tells him.

  “Thanks,” Dee says.

  Then he stands. It takes Wally by surprise. Dee stands, his softening cock still impressive, swinging between his legs. He’s looking around at the floor. Finally he spots his underwear and pulls it on, then does the same with his jeans.

  “What’s going on?” Wally asks.

  “Nothing,” Dee says. His voice is even. “I sleep better by myself.”

  “Oh.” Wally doesn’t know what to say. “Okay.”

  Dee’s pulling on his shirt. “You didn’t expect me to sleep with you, did you?”

  Wally tries to find the boy’s eyes but they’re averted. “Not if you don’t want to.”

  “I’m sure you don’t want some kid getting attached,” Dee says.

  “Come here,” Wally says, patting the spot on the bed beside him.

  “Look, man, I got what I wanted. It’s cool.”

  “What do you mean?”

  The boy shrugs. “I got my rocks off. I told my friends I’d get you into bed and I did.” He laughs. “You old guys are all the same. All a kid like me has to do is smile and we’ve got you. So it’s cool. We both got what we wanted, right?”

  “Dee, it wasn’t like that—”

  “Dude, come on. I’m telling you it’s cool. You’ve done this hundreds of times. You told me so. You don’t have to start the whole ‘It was really meaningful’ thing with me. I’m not attached. It’s cool.” He places his hand on the doorknob. “So it was fun. Thanks. See
you around.”

  Wally says nothing, just stares at him. Dee gives him a quick little smile. Then he’s gone.

  What does a gay kid want most of all? Does he want platitudes and theory? Wise words and sage counsel? Deep and meaningful relationships with horny older men? Fuck that. What had Wally wanted, that first day he’d ridden his bike over to see Zandy?

  He’d wanted to get his rocks off.

  But more than that: he’d wanted his sexuality affirmed. He’d wanted proof that it was real, that it could happen, that he was an attractive person, that he was as gay as much as anyone else, that an adult might actually take him seriously.

  Seriously enough to want to have sex with him.

  Seriously enough to love him.

  For that’s what it came down to: Zandy had loved him. Maybe it was wrong what he did. Maybe he didn’t always do right by Wally. But Zandy had loved him, in a way no one had ever loved him before.

  And no one would, ever again.

  Except for Ned. But Ned’s love had been different. It was the love of an equal. The love of a peer. They had been boys, wild with possibilities, tumbling over each other in bed and in life. Together they were a whirlwind of energy, of adventure, of exploration. Zandy had been grounded, rooted to the earth.

  He met Ned toward the end of his freshman year in college. Ned was born in the city, a plumber in his family’s business, a big bruiser with lots of “dezes” and “dozes” in his speech. Who would have thought this would be Wally’s great love? They met when Ned had come with his uncle to fix some pipes in Wally’s dorm. Enough meaningful glances had been exchanged between the boys for Ned to sneak back into the dorm that night, making love to Wally in his upper bunk as his clueless roommate slept soundly. From then on, Ned and Wally were inseparable.

  Ned loved the fact that Wally was an actor. Opening night, no matter where it was—Dubuque or Dayton or Tallahassee—there was Ned, front row and center, leading the applause. “I’d’a been an actor, too,” Ned would say, “if I’d been handsome like Wally.”

  But Ned was handsome. So what if he had a gut from too much beer and started losing his hair at twenty-three? He had the most amazing eyes, ice blue like a Siberian husky’s, and the cutest nose, almost like a girl’s, turned up and perky. Wally was a regular at the gym, keeping his body fit and toned: he had to, if he wanted to land parts. But Ned got squishy over the course of their decade together, and sometimes he’d forget to trim his nose hairs unless Wally reminded him.